Thursday's Child
by drewbug
Summary: Another Thursday, another criminal.


Thursday's Child  
  
by Nicole Clevenger (c)December 2003  
  
Notes: Written for the "Thursday" challenge at thursday100plus.  
  
~  
  
Monday's child is fair of face,  
  
Tuesday's child is full of grace,  
  
Wednesday's child is full of woe,  
  
Thursday's child has far to go,  
  
Friday's child is loving and giving,  
  
Saturday's child must work for a living,  
  
But the child that's born on the Sabbath day  
  
Is fair and wise and good and gay.   
  
~  
  
Alex never could get the hang of Thursdays.  
  
Never could understand *why*, either. It wasn't as if Thursdays regularly contained some kind of dreaded meeting or deadline. And Thursdays were almost Fridays, really, which meant that the weekend was one step closer than it had been the day before. Maybe it was just that - no matter how busy she might be - Thursdays always seemed to drag along. Long plodding stretches of time that refused to conform to the week's normal rules.   
  
Nothing good ever came of a Thursday, not in her experience. And this Thursday was no exception.  
  
Beside her Deakins said, "He's got ten more minutes. Then I'm pulling him out."  
  
"Captain, I know how it looks," Alex protested, hating herself even as she said the words. "But you've got to give him a chance. This guy killed a *kid*. We had a hard enough time getting him in here - no way are we letting him walk out."  
  
Deakins looked at her like she'd just announced that Yogurt Pop Tarts were a work of culinary genius. "Goren's dead on his feet in there." He gestured in the direction of the interrogation room, where her partner had been holding his own for the last hour plus. As if she needed to be reminded. As if she hadn't noticed. "I don't plan on letting this guy go either - all I'm suggesting is a bit of a break."  
  
Alex turned back to the window, watching the slowed and stuttered approximations of Goren's familiar motions. They'd been pushing themselves hard for weeks looking for a break in this case, but this morning she'd sensed more than just fatigue to her partner's abnormally drawn features. She'd suspected he might've thrown up sometime after their working lunch; she wasn't going to ask, but she'd been about to suggest he knock off early when the call came in. Their main suspect had been picked up, and he was on his way over to them. There was no going home after that.  
  
Now they needed a confession - without one, everything they had was merely circumstantial - but the perp had flat out refused to talk to her. So Alex had gotten stuck on the other side of the window with Deakins, while her partner was left alone to deal with Whitman and his lawyer. But Goren was off his game, getting nowhere, and it wasn't exactly the world's easiest thing to watch. Still, she didn't want to take the chance of breaking his rhythm, splintered as it might be. She'd long since learned that the best thing to do when Bobby Goren started going was just to let him go.   
  
In the other room, Goren squeezed the bridge of his nose. "This is a waste of time," he mumbled, shaking his head.  
  
Deakins glanced at her, took a step closer to the window. Alex didn't take her eyes off her partner.  
  
Goren pushed himself to his feet, both hands braced on the table. "This -" Without warning, he kicked out sideways and sent the chair tumbling across the room. " - is a *waste of time*."   
  
Everyone flinched, but Goren didn't move. Whitman glanced at his lawyer, looking nervous. "Waste of time. That's what I been saying," Whitman agreed with an uncertain laugh.  
  
"Sure." Goren's laugh sounded almost natural. "You didn't do this."   
  
The other two men seemed to relax.   
  
Alex's shoulders were tensed up to somewhere around her ears.  
  
"My client has said from the start that he's innocent, Detective." The lawyer glanced at Whitman, then back to Goren. "Can I ask why you've suddenly changed your mind?"  
  
Goren shrugged and moved as if to go. He stopped just short of the door, then turned back. "It's just that..." He made a dismissive motion with a hand and turned to the door again.  
  
*Come on. Come on. Come on.* Alex repeated in her head.   
  
  
  
"Hey - 'it's just that' what?" Whitman said.  
  
Goren stopped, his hand on the doorknob. She saw the pause of a deep breath move through his shoulders; when he looked back over his shoulder there was a casually amused smile on his pale face. "What... seriously?"  
  
Whitman looked at him blankly, unsure of the joke. Goren returned to stand on the other side of the table, the smile still there. "Look, it's obvious how much careful planning went into this murder. And, well..." He leaned in close to their suspect. "Frankly? You're just too stupid to pull something like this off."  
  
Whitman's outraged "I ain't -" was drowned out by his lawyer's "Detective, there's no call for -"  
  
Goren gripped the edge of the table; Alex could see the muscles in his arms and back tighten through his shirt. She thought he might've closed his eyes, and she resisted a sudden urge to bolt for the door.   
  
*Come on. Come on. Come on.*  
  
"Oh, please, Counselor," Goren sneered, his head bowed. "Your client hasn't said one intelligent thing since he got in here."   
  
"I ain't stupid," Whitman growled. His lawyer put a hand on his arm, but the man shook it off. "No, fuck that! They were the stupid ones - that cunt of a mother let me just *walk* away with that little girl. They didn't have a fucking *clue*..."  
  
Goren's head came up slowly; he nodded tiredly as he straightened. "My mistake."  
  
The captain hit the button to switch off the intercom. "About time," Deakins sighed as they watched Goren leave the interrogation room. Alex felt the tension easing its way out of her shoulders.  
  
Her partner came in and leaned heavily against the wall by the door. Deakins gave her a look; on his way out, he rested a hand on Goren's shoulder. "Good job. Now get the hell out of here."  
  
She cracked the seal on a bottle of water and crossed the room to offer it to him. He took it woodenly, completely drained of what little energy he'd managed to dredge up for the show in the other room. "I didn't think that was going to work," he said.  
  
Through the window, Whitman's lawyer shook his head and said something they couldn't hear. Whatever his client's answer, it didn't look to be very polite.  
  
"Just another Thursday," Alex said.  
  
end. 


End file.
